Mourning Achebe

The world has been united in celebrating Chinua Achebe since his passing last week. Commentators have hailed his contributions to learning, for he was a teacher. Essayists have applauded his impeccable literary effort, some of which earned him universal respect and prized awards to boot. Some too have chronicled his life and times, tracing the journey of a boy-child born in Ogidi in present-day Anambra State, who would forge an early pact with the academia, virtually living in the library, churning out a masterpiece at age 28 before passing on at 82 in the United States. Mention was made of his stint in the media, of his involvement in the Civil War, and of his flight overseas where he spent a good part of his memorable life. In the end, everyone seemed agreed that there, encased in a casket in America lies a great man, indeed one of the greatest Africa has produced.

All of that fills me with a sense of personal gratitude. I feel like saying thank you to all of you for doing your bit in immortalising the great Achebe who, without knowing me helped in shaping my life the way fathers do. I never got closer to him than several metres at an event way back in time, and to this point I will return shortly, but the man had made an indelible impression on me even before that august occasion.

Yet, for all the outpouring of encomiums, it hurts to note that much cynicism overlay or underlay some of the comments on Achebe. You could pick out the snicker when commentators mentioned his last literary effort “There was a country”. The cynicism was accentuated when analysts tended to minimise him as a tribalist or even credit him with little love for his country.

If Achebe seemed disenchanted with Nigeria, it should be noted that it really was not about the country but about its leadership. Twice he turned down national honours not because he personally hated Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, who first offered it when he was president, or President Goodluck Jonathan who also included the celebrated author on his award list. Achebe never hid his disenchantment with what he perceived as a drift in leadership. Neither was he alone in this grief. Nigerians of different stripes are just as unhappy. Clerics bemoan the state of things. Writers and commentators continuously clamour for a better country. Even some who have accepted national honours have from time to time expressed worry at the profile of a potentially rich country hosting a mass of poor people.

If Achebe was indeed a tribalist, he was no more than anyone else. Perhaps, his brand of tribalism was of the healthy sort, without poison or blood, machetes or bombs. He was a great man in every sense of the word.

His Things Fall Apart helped to educate me more than some of my teachers tried. His simple yet profound narrative gripped me as a boy. It held me spellbound as a young man in the university. It reinforced what my HOD, Francis Ngwaba, once said that there is sophistication in simplicity. I found Achebe approachable. He encouraged me to study. But there was more to his works than simple language and unforced plot. He fictionalised the African reality but above that, did his best to correct a warped Western view of the continent and its people. Achebe gave back pride to the African, reminding the world that his history is not one long nightmare.

For this, accomplished writers continue to praise him, some calling him a trailblazer, some father of modern African literature. Some regret that the Nobel authorities somewhat conspiratorially robbed Achebe of their prized honour. I do too. But I do not bemoan that. For the Nobel would not have made him a more profound writer, only a prize for what he had written. Besides, if he was deliberately ignored, other accomplished literary figures were likewise overlooked. The spite did not detract from their works nor from their worth; it only cast a shadow of doubt on the integrity of the awarding authorities. What indeed can you write to get the Nobel prize?

Over a decade ago, Achebe delivered one of the Ahajiokwu Lectures in Owerri. I was there and there he was in his wheelchair doing his best wake up the Igbo and work towards a better future. He said Echi di ime, ma taa bu gbo, literally meaning the future may be unknown but you can start today. I cherish that distant meeting.

There may be a point of disagreement with Achebe, though. He said in his greatest novel that the white man put a knife on the things that held us together and we fell apart. He blamed the white man’s cunning and his religion. I do not know how much of those words frozen in his fiction he lived out in his eventful life. If he really believed the white man erred by knocking down our gods and our shrines and planting his religion on the African soil, I do not. I also believe that this new religion in itself and true form is not injurious to us. Neither does it undermine us as a people. It is the false pretenders to the faith that are the problem.